ren’s Reviews > Carmilla > Status Update

"The amphibious existence of the vampires is sustained by daily renewed slumber in the grave. It's horrible lust for living blood supplies the vigor of its waking existence.
The vampire is prone to be fascinated with an engrossing vehemence, resembling the passion of love, by particular persons. In pursuit of these it will exercise inexhaustible patience and stratagem..."

"Here then, were all the admitted signs and proofs of vampirism. The body, therefore, in accordance with the ancient practice, was raised, and a sharp stake driven through the heart of the vampire. It uttered a piercing shriek at that moment, in all respects such as might escape from a living person in the last agony. Then the head was struck off, and a torrent of blood flowed from the severed neck."

"Her features, though a hundred and fifty years had passed since her funeral, were tinted with the warmth of life. Her eyes were open; no cadaverous smell exhaled from the coffin. The two medical men attested to the marvelous fact that there was a faint but appreciable respiration and corresponding action of the heart. The limbs were perfectly flexible, the flesh elastic, and the leaden coffin filled with blood."

"'Carmilla, yes,' I answered.
'Aye,' he said, 'that is Millarca. The same person who long ago was called Mircalla, Countess Karnstein. Depart from this accursed ground, my poor child, as quickly as you can. Drive to the clergyman's house and stay there till we come. Begone! May you never behold Carmilla more; you will not find her here.'"

"In seeing him a brutal change came over her features. It was an instantaneous and horrible transformation; she made a crouching step backwards. Before I could utter a scream, he struck at her with all his force. She dove under his blow and, unscathed, caught him by the wrist in her tiny grasp. He struggled for a moment to release his arm, but his hand opened, the axe fell to the ground, and the girl was gone."

"Under a narrow, arched doorway, surmounted by one of those demoniacal grotesques in which the cynical and ghastly fancy of old Gothic carving delights, I saw the beautiful face and figure of Carmilla enter the shadowy chapel."

"He apologized for having followed me but said that he could not conscientiously take his leave without a few words more. He told me that he could not be mistaken; no natural disease exhibited the same symptoms; death was already very near. One more assault might extinguish the last spark of vitality which is, every moment, ready to die."

"'How came the village to be deserted?' asked the general.
'It was troubled by revenants, sir; several were tracked to their graves and extinguished in the usual ways: by decapitation, by the stake, and by burning. But not until many of the villagers were killed.'"

"'I have been a woodsman here,' he answered in his patois, 'all my days. So was my father before me, and so on, as many generations as I can count. I could show you the very house in the village in which my ancestors lived."

"It was a bad family, and here it's bloodstained annals were written. It is hard that they should, after death, continue to plague the human race with their atrocious lusts."